


rolling thunder

by geoantennae



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: ALL THE FEARS BASICALLY, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Bugs & Insects, Canon-typical apocalypse, Claustrophobia, Death, Dehumanization, Gen, Insanity, Loneliness, Post-Episode 160, Season/Series 04, THAT'S KINDA WHAT THIS IS ABOUT, he's having a great time guys dw about it, jon goes full archivist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-23 03:22:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21313351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geoantennae/pseuds/geoantennae
Summary: The archivist looks out, beyond the shattered glass and out into the shattered world, where the apocalypse of his own creation begins in earnest.It’sbeautiful.(or: jon goes for a nice walk, on a lovely day, and sees some things which are not good cows)
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 19
Kudos: 139





	rolling thunder

**Author's Note:**

> i've seen a lot of "jon is still human and very guilty and martin is there for him" fics and you are all so valid and giving me life but i thought i'd just balance it out a little bit :) this is my take on a post-apocalypse world and, if i'm honest, a bit of a love letter to MAG 120

It’s–

The archivist stands transfixed, his eyes alight with an intensity that Martin has never seen in them before. And the archivist knows this, in the same way he knows everything that clutches at the heart with an icy grip, that makes the hands tremble and the knees weak with fear.

It’s–

The archivist looks out, beyond the shattered glass and out into the shattered world, where the apocalypse of his own creation begins in earnest.

It’s _beautiful._

The archivist barely feels Martin’s hands pulling at his arm, barely hears his panicked and stuttering words pleading at him to stop, to stay here, don’t go outside, it’s dangerous – barely even registers the fact that _dangerous_ might possibly be the biggest understatement in the end of the world. For the archivist does not feel his own fear anymore. That is no longer his job.

And so the archivist goes out to do what, really, he has been doing all along.

It’s just a little easier now.

The archivist sees the lightning crashing down into the earth, its impossible arching patterns bleeding out across the sky in currents that the eyes are drawn to follow – that bring out harsh, echoing laughter with the realisation that sanity is a fair price to pay for the comprehension of such beauty. He sees corridors, and mirrors, and crooked fingers. He sees the smile of a monster that knows it won’t be going hungry for a long time.

The archivist smells the blood, feels the rush of adrenaline spike in those creatures who know not what they are other than prey. He sees through the eyes of the predators, knows where to run, knows where to strike. He sees ardent forests turned into battlegrounds; otherworldly spaces where you can run and run and run and never catch or be caught by a single thing.

The archivist hears the drums of war. The beat of that call to arms pounds in his very soul, cutting through him like the knife that glides through flesh – once – twice – a thousand times – singing as it returns unto its wielder the revenge they so rightfully deserve.

The archivist sees things that cannot be described, only felt, as the knowledge of what they _should_ be hammers at the walls of your skull like a bird trying to escape from its cage despite the fact that it is dead, or was dead, or should be dead. He sees the glass eyes of lifelong friends who don’t look like they did a moment ago, and plastic mannequins who seem much more lifelike than any real person you have ever met, if you could only remember what it is to be real.

The archivist sees great, hulking beasts that shuffle across the landscape, incongruous amalgamations of limbs, bones and eyes, fingers and teeth. The archivist knows what they used to be, and knows that they can still feel pain.

The archivist feels the ground beneath him tremble and shift. He sees the hands of those who have long forgotten the light reach out to pull the unfortunate living down into the warm and cloying earth. He sees the walls closing in. He sees the dirt reclaim civilizations which have ignored the promise of sleep for far too long.

The archivist sees those corners and edges of uninhabited space, where the light can’t reach and never will. He sees people hiding behind curtains from the horrors outside, unaware that the thing they should be afraid of waits with them in the gently humming darkness.

The archivist feels the icy wind whipping at his hair, his clothes, his face, whispering to him all the things he already knows. He sees the lost and alone, left with everything they ever loved turned to dust.

The archivist sees the swarms, the clouds made of particles too small to make out until millions come as one, boring into skin, eating into bone, deconstructing and disintegrating until only the tiniest pieces can come back together to join the whole. He sees cities full of people in their crowded and pushing masses, succumbing to the disease which only makes them suffer more the longer they cling desperately to each other.

The archivist sees the destruction. It doesn’t even have to act, not really, buildings crumbling to ashes in a matter of minutes, entire lives torn apart in the seconds it takes them to wonder whether the possessions they lost to the flames were ever really theirs at all.

The archivist sees the death. It has always been inescapable, but here, now, the fear is so tangible and sweet on his lips that it seems the whole world is made of it.

The archivist goes to the sea, to the waves which envelop the shore and pull the endless grains of sand back into its inevitable embrace. He sees something so huge and unfathomably deep that to comprehend it in its entirety is to walk without hesitation under its surface, where the stars can show you how small you really are, if you’ll only try to each for them. He hears the call too, watches those who are claimed by the vertigo make their final journey – but the archivist can hear so many things, so many calls and screams and cries and whimpers that to obey just one of them is to break the spider-silk threads that connect him to them all.

The archivist does not need to sleep in order to dream, anymore. He feels all of it, all the terror, the devastation, the heartbreak, the pure and unrivalled _fear_ that streams into him from every living thing on the planet at once. He does not blink, cannot stop the tears that flow from his eyes as he wanders ceaselessly through the world that is ending.

The archivist sees–

_everything–_

and laughs, giddy with delight and revelling in the power that infinite knowledge brings. At last, he understands, gazing up into the eye that he has hidden from for so long and finally _seeing_ it in all its glory.

It has so much to show him.

**Author's Note:**

> title is from Rolling Thunder by LUMP which is an incredible song for the end of MAG 160 and you should listen to it immediately
> 
> please come and yell at me at geoliae on tumblr!! <3


End file.
